Friday, October 31, 2008

Here is a map and list of all of the American-born MLS goal scorers from the 2008 regular season categorized by their home states. I used the hometown info from the MLSnet player stats to determine each player's home state.

Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Quite a few leagues around Europe have some interesting leaders through the first part of the season. Valencia, Udinese, Hoffenheim, Groningen, Rubin Kazan, CD Nacional have all displaced the "big" clubs in their leagues for the time being. Will they be able to hold on? For the most part, probably not, but strange things can happen. These are many of the current league leaders around Europe with the clubs linked to their profiles at the site Albion Road.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

The US election day is coming up and I don't know about everyone else but I'm ready for it to be over. At least seeing all the election commercials and internet stories gave me a marginally interesting idea for a "fun" soccer related post. Players with US president names, yay!

These are all players that have the same name as a former US president. I pulled the names from soccerdata.net which is an interesting site, but I'm guessing somewhat out of date due to the vast size of their database. Because of that, I'd guess that a few of these players aren't actually playing at the clubs listed anymore, but honestly I don't have time to double check today (it's my daughter's 3rd birthday). Feel free to help me out if you see any mistakes.

Washington - Happy Valley (Hong Kong), Fluminense (Brazil)

Lincoln - Galatasaray (Turkey)

Jefferson - Palmeiras (Brazil), São José (Brazil)

Jackson - Porto Alegre (Brazil)

Harrison - Figueirense (Brazil)

Arthur - Fluminense (Brazil), Internacional (Brazil)

Wilson - Figueirense (Brazil), Santos (Brazil)

Here are some that are very close to the full names of Former US Presidents:

Friday, October 24, 2008

This map shows all of the away games (including exhibition games) that the globe-trotting Los Angeles Galaxy have played in the 2008 season. I've also included the two upcoming NZ and Australia fixtures. Click the icons for game results and zoom in to see the stadiums. Click view larger map for better navigation options.

Monday, October 20, 2008

Here is a map and list of every team that has been ranked in the top 25 of the FIFA rankings since the rankings began in December of 1992. The list shows the highest ranking each nation has achieved in the past 16 years.

Wednesday, October 15, 2008

These are the most productive offensive MLS players dollar values per combined goal/assist total (min 10 combined). [yearly salary divided by goal/assist total]

Not surprisingly the DP players ended up at the bottom as they'd have to have pretty spectactular seasons to get the $ per g/a lower.

It's pretty hard to believe that Kenny Cooper only makes marginally more than Alan Gordon, but they've actually both proven to be fairly good value per goal/assist.

David Beckham's cost of $464,268 per goal/assist is more than the yearly salary of every player in the league outside of the Designated Players. I'm pretty sure that's not why they pay him the big bucks though.

[UPDATE, OCT 24, 1:30PM]I'll update this post at the end of the regular season on Monday, Oct 27. I can say that there is a new leader in the chart that is not Chris Rolfe (sorry Bill). Chris did move up the list with last nights performance against NY and his value is now at $5,380 per goal/assist.)

Any guesses on the new leader? He wasn't previously on the list but picked up an assist last week to give him a combined goal/assist total of 10. Hint: His 2008 salary is $33,000 and he plays in the Western Conference.

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

I'm really glad that Brazilian soccer stars use their one name monikers. Otherwise we'd have to listen to Christopher Sullivan and Christian Miles (USA based Fox Soccer announcers for those around the world) pronounce Ricardo Izecson dos Santos Leite in their best Mario and Luigi impressions. Instead they can just say, Kaká.

Here are the full names of many of the top Brazilian stars of the past and present.

New Zealand was this biggest mover with an amazing jump from a poor 111 rank to a respectable 54. How'd they get there? With two wins over their Oceania rival New Caledonia who were ranked 16 places ahead of the Kiwis at 95 when the games took place.

The two Congos in Africa did the old switcharoo this month. Congo went from a rank of 100 to 57. Conversely Congo DR, who were previously ranked 32 places ahead of their neighbors, is now ranked below them by 28 places, falling from 68 to 85.

Congo, Montenegro, and Lithuania are all currently at their highest ever FIFA ranking.

The biggest drop in the top 50 was Scotland, who moved from 16 to 26 because of a WCQ loss to Macedonia.

Thursday, October 9, 2008

I was watching the CCL game on Tuesday night between Houston and San Francisco (Panama) and had a random thought when the back of Nate Jaqua's jersey was shown. I wonder how many players have a Q in their last name? I know, not the most useful information in the world, but once it popped in my head I had to find out. Here is the "Q" list from MLS, USL1, and a few of the big leagues in Europe (last names only).

Barcelona leads the way with 4 Q players on their first team and Quique and Aquivaldo Mosquera are the only double Q players.

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Liverpool has one of the more interesting player birthplace maps because a large number of their players come from pretty small towns as opposed to larger cities. Click the icons for the player names and birthplaces and zoom in to see their birth towns. Click view larger map for easier navigation options.

Tuesday, October 7, 2008

I was reading a post at Big Soccer the other day and for the umpteenth time someone chimed in with the, it's "football" not "soccer" argument (they also threw in a pro/rel in America because MLS is not "European" enough, but back to the point).

Here is a list of alternate names for "football" that are regularly used all over the world. In fact the combined populations of the nations that use the term soccer is well over a half a billion (632,655,865).

Monday, October 6, 2008

I was browsing through the UEFA Champions League rosters the other day and noticed that some of the players looked an awful lot like a few of the players in Major League Soccer. I haven't done a look-a-like post since the Euro 2008 head coach look-a-likes, so I was due for another one.

Here are some players from Major League Soccer that look eerily similar to their European based counterparts.

John Wolyniec (NY) and Thomas Augustinussen (Aalborg BK)

Craig Waibel (HOU) and Franck Jurietti (Bordeaux)

Michael Parkhurst (NE) and Roman Eremenko (Dynamo Kiev)

Justin Mapp (CHI) and Boudewijn Zenden (Olympique Marseille)

Sacha Kljestan (CHV) and Fucile (Porto)

Shalrie Joseph (NE) and Royston Drenthe (Real Madrid)

Kevin Hartman (KC) and Sebastien Frei (Fiorentina)

Abe Thompson (KC) and Arthur Bernhardt (Steaua Bucharest)

Jorge Flores (CHV) and Yasin Çakmak (Fenerbahçe)

Kenny Cooper (DAL) and Chris Killen (Celtic)

Brian Ching (HOU) and Julio Cruz (Inter Milan)

Jon Busch (CHI) and Michael Beauchamp (Aalborg BK)

Jonathan Bornstein (CHV) and Alvaro Arbeloa (Liverpool)

Cuauhtemoc Blanco (CHI) and Aleksandr Yurevich (FC BATE)

Chad Barrett (TOR) and Wayne Rooney (Manchester United)

One of my first posts at The Best Eleven was an MLS celebrity look-a-like post. If you missed it the first time around, check it out here.

Sunday, October 5, 2008

Here is an interactive google map of Chivas USA's roster showing the birthplaces of all of the players. Click the icons for the player names and birthplaces. Click view larger map for better navigation options.

Saturday, October 4, 2008

Here is an interactive google map of the Chicago Fire's roster showing the birthplaces of all of the players. Click the icons for the player names and birthplaces. Click view larger map for better navigation options.

Friday, October 3, 2008

Here is some age analysis of all of the goal scorers in the 2008 Major League Soccer season up to and including last night's Dallas/San Jose game (Oct 2). I used the ages as of October 1, so this analysis doesn't account for birthdays that may have happened during the season.

Thursday, October 2, 2008

I've always found it interesting to see players from lower-ranked soccer nations playing in big time games with their clubs. These are all of the players on the 2008/2009 Champions League Rosters that come from nations that are currently FIFA ranked at least 50 or higher.

FC Bate Borisov (Belarus) and Anorthosis Famagusta FC (Cyprus) are both comprised of a majority of players from low ranking nations. Somewhat surprisingly, CFR Cluj (Romania), only has two players from lower ranked nations on their roster, one being Lars Hirschfeld (Canada), the only non-Mexican CONCACAF player in the competition.